Creating Learning Environments in the Early Grades that Support Teacher and Student Success: Profiles of Effective Practices in Three Expanded Learning Time Schools

The purpose of this report is to describe how schools that have converted to longer operational days—known as"expanded-time" schools—better support the development of young children. The National Center on Time & Learning (NCTL) has chosen to document the work of these three particular schools from among its network of over 60 expanded-time schools because, over the last few years, they have demonstrated in concrete, ever-evolvingways, how time can be leveraged to optimal effect in educating young students. Though the practices they have honed are not unique, these schools show a distinctive capacity both to be creative about how best to serve their youngest students and to put in place the structures that allow these innovative approaches to flourish. Still, the educatorsin these schools are quick to admit that their classrooms and other supports for students in the early grades are works in progress. As such, the insights we draw from them are intended as guideposts along a path toward excellent education in the early grades, rather than definitive portraits of the destination.